TEHRAN, Sept. 22 (Mehr News Agency) -- Scandal after scandal, from Abu Ghraib and Haditha to Blackwater, the disaster goes on and on. It seems that the war in Iraq has become an endless array of immoral actions by U.S. forces. They torture prisoners, kill civilians, and now have been implicated in gunrunning in Iraq.

The war in Iraq is not really the story of a battle between U.S. troops and anti-U.S. insurgents. There are other players with their own agendas such as U.S. mercenary companies.

Everything is privatized in the United States, even the military. There are thousands of mercenaries from private companies that are augmenting the 160,000 regular U.S. armed forces in Iraq. However, none of these companies are as infamous as Blackwater in the international arena.

The United States' private armies were not a focus of attention before reports revealed that some private security firms had tortured prisoners in their own private jails in Afghanistan. This scandal caused some tension in Kabul-Washington relations but eventually little was done to punish the real culprits.

Due to the need for more troops in Iraq, Blackwater mercenaries who were not properly trained and who were unfamiliar with the country were sent to Iraq to protect diplomats and civilian workers.

After a convoy of U.S. diplomats was ambushed in Baghdad, Blackwater mercenaries recklessly opened fire, killing a number of Iraqi civilians.

After this scandal, Iraqi officials decided to prohibit Blackwater from conducting activities in the country and called for the culprits to be tried in Iraq.

But just like in the Haditha and Abu Ghraib scandals, it seems that there will be no trials in Iraq and the security company has resumed its activities in the war-torn country.

And now Blackwater has been accused of gunrunning in Iraq.

A company source acknowledged that two Blackwater employees were fired for buying guns with Blackwater money and selling them without the consent or knowledge of the company, but did not say where the arms were bought and sold.

The U.S. attorney's office in Raleigh, North Carolina is currently investigating individual Blackwater employees -- not the company -- for illegal weapons deals.

Washington is hypocritically accusing other countries and groups of involvement in terrorist activities in Iraq while U.S.-based private security companies are conducting dubious activities in the middle of a war.

The U.S. has created a stir by accusing Iran of smuggling weapons to Iraq without providing any proof.

However, there is evidence that the United States is smuggling weapons to Iraq, which means that U.S. troops are being killed by U.S. weapons.

Of course, the U.S. military-industrial complex's involvement in the lucrative arms smuggling business is nothing new. The same thing happened in the Vietnam War and again in the current war in Afghanistan.

In all three wars, the U.S. military-industrial complex profited from smuggling arms and drugs, and this course of action is unlikely to change in the future.

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of foriegn policy, politics, peace, and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.